How do you get a chart comparing the performance of holdings where reinvestments are presumed... in other words comparing 'total return' ? The problem I see is that most stock charts (yahoo, google, msn, etc) only track NAV-based performance.... which is very misleading for high-income holdings where reinvestment is occurring. So, if you want to compare the 3 such holdings (such as BND vs. AGG vs. LSBDX) to see comparitive performance over a specific time period.... how do you chart the 'total return' difference?

PS: I did find a newer website, ycharts.com, that very nicely provides 'total return' charts for stocks and etf's... but not for mutual funds.

Last edited by fx24 on Fri Jan 27, 2012 1:41 am, edited 1 time in total.

Bloomberg's chart is primative. Very cool is a chart like this showing a single securities growth spread (NAV vs. Total Return). You can really visualize the importance of income. Made this on ycharts but, again unfortunately, it does not chart mutual funds.

fx24 wrote:How do you get a chart comparing the performance of holdings where reinvestments are presumed... in other words comparing 'total return' ? The problem I see is that most stock charts (yahoo, google, msn, etc) only track NAV-based performance.... which is very misleading for high-income holdings where reinvestment is occurring. So, if you want to compare the 3 such holdings (such as BND vs. AGG vs. LSBDX) to see comparitive performance over a specific time period.... how do you chart the 'total return' difference?

PS: I did find a newer website, ycharts.com, that very nicely provides 'total return' charts for stocks and etf's... but not for mutual funds.

At morningstar, the $10,000 growth chart includes reinvestments to show total return.

The one gotcha with Morningstar is you have to be careful with ETFS. If you start with an ETF you get NAV. If you start with an actual mutual fund and add an ETF to the chart the ETF will have total return.

stratton wrote:The one gotcha with Morningstar is you have to be careful with ETFS. If you start with an ETF you get NAV. If you start with an actual mutual fund and add an ETF to the chart the ETF will have total return.

Paul

M* is quirky; I might say "buggy". If you try to go change the date range the chart can spontaneously revert from growth to price. And using the pull-down Growth-Price selector doesn't always work. It can be frustrating to play with.